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Program News | Program News Archive
Sharon Mihalic has been notified that she is the 2008 recipient of the Science to Practice Award from The Society for Prevention Research. She will receive the award in San Francisco in May for her outstanding contributions to advancing the field of prevention science. "This recognition is richly deserved for the fantastic work she has done over the years", says Terry Thornberry.
Mike Radelet, Chair of Sociology and Faculty Research Associate, Problem Behavior Program, has recently won two CU Service Awards: one from the Boulder Faculty Assembly for work on the Boulder campus ($3,000), and the Chase Faculty Community Service Award from the CU System ($10,000). April 14, 2008
The 2008 Blueprints Conference was held March 17-19, 2008, at the Adams Mark Hotel in Denver. The Blueprints Conference is a 3-day conference exploring model programs with positive results for youth and their families, hosted by The Blueprints for Violence Prevention Initiative at the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence. The conference drew nearly 1,100 attendees from the U.S. and about a dozen other countries. Conference highlights included presentations by distinguished prevention science expert, Dr. Delbert Elliott and economist, Steve Aos, as well as many other seasoned practitioners in the field. This conference motivated the prevention field to adopt evidence-based programs and provide support, guidance, and tools by program experts to help practitioners implement these programs successfully in their own communities. Visit the Blueprints Conference Website.
Kelly E. Knight presented a paper, "Assortative Mating for Antisocial Behavior", at the Annual Conference for The American Society of Criminology in Atlanta, GA, held November 14-17, 2007. Using data from the Rochester Youth Development Study, the paper showed that males but not females positively assortated on seven different measures of antisocial behavior.
Kelly is a Ph.D. graduate student in Sociology and Graduate Research Assistant in the Rochester Youth Development Study here in the Problem Behavior Program at IBS.
David Miklowitz received a $600,000 grant to fund a new study of family psychoeducational treatment from the National Institute of Mental Health. Dr. Kiki Chang of Stanford University is a co-principal investigator on the project. This study is to determine if early treatment of children with a high risk of developing bipolar disorder can help head off the disease's effects before they severely disrupt people's lives.
A podcast featuring Miklowitz discussing his bipolar disorder research can be heard on the Web at www.colorado.edu/news/podcasts/.
Read the entire news release here (pdf).
Sharon Mihalic
and Abigail Fagan, Social Development Research Group, University of Washington, conducted a one-day preconference on May 29th, 2007 at the Society for Prevention Research in Washington D.C. The workshop was entitled "Using Tested Programs in the Real World—Strategies and Tools to Promote Implementation Fidelity." The workshop was designed so that participants would:
1. Understand the importance of achieving implementation fidelity of tested programs.
2. Agree upon common elements of implementation fidelity and discuss ways of measuring these elements.
3. Discuss the pros and cons of when and how to adapt programs to the local situation.
4. Identify general models, tools and strategies that promote implementation fidelity.
Del Elliott was quoted in an article in the Rocky Mountain News April 4, 2007, concerning the sealing of the depositions on the Columbine High School shootings.
Joanne Belknap will be presenting a talk entitled "Gateways to Girls' Illegal Behaviors" at the Understanding Girls' Problem Behaviors Conference, Örebro University, Örebro, Sweden in February 2007.
Richard Jessor was an invited participant in the year-long Psychology Speaker Series organized by the psychologists at RAND in Santa Monica, CA. His talk, on January 18, dealt with the findings from the Denver-Beijing-Zhengzhou collaborative study of risk and protective factors in adolescent risk behavior and development. Jessor's presentation emphasized that the underlying explanatory account of risk behavior was largely invariant across such radically different societal contexts.
The Program of Research on the Causes and Correlates of Delinquency, composed of three longitudinal studies of delinquency which began in 1986, is celebrating its 20th Anniversary. Two of the projects - the Denver Youth Survey with David Huizinga as Principal Investigator and the Rochester Youth Development Study with Terence P. Thornberry as Principal Investigator - are housed at the Problem Behavior Program. Our companion project, the Pittsburgh Youth Study, is directed by Rolf Loeber at the University of Pittsburgh. The projects were initiated by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and, in addition to OJJDP, have received support from a variety of agencies including the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Institute of Justice, and the National Science Foundation.
The projects began with a common theme - to investigate the antecedents and consequences of delinquency and related problem behaviors, with a special emphasis on serious, chronic offenders. They continue to examine these issues, but each project has expanded in a variety of ways and they currently investigate a host of topics related to human development. The projects have followed their samples from childhood through early adulthood, have a large shared measurement space to enable replication, and represent the longest-running collaborative study of delinquency ever launched.
To recognize the accomplishments of the Program of Research, a Presidential Session was held on November 3, 2006 at the annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology to summarize past findings and describe future directions. The session was followed by a reception for current and former staff members, grant officers, and advisors. We look forward to the next 20 years!
Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence
Del Elliott was invited to present at the White House Conference on School Safety on October 10, 2006. Del was on a panel chaired by Attorney General Gonzales that discussed the epidemiology and etiology of school violence and potential steps that might be taken to make our schools safer.
As a followup to the White House Conference, there was a Safe Communities~Safe Schools Convening at The Colorado Trust on November 29, 2006. The Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence (CSPV) assisted in the development of the agenda and Del Elliott was a keynote presenter at the meeting which included the Governor-elect, Bill Ritter, and other Colorado agency directors, legislators and educators. The purpose of the day-long meeting was to discuss the state of school violence in Colorado and the next steps to address the issues. In addition to Del Elliott, CSPV was represented by Jane Grady, Bill Woodward, and Sabrina Arredondo Mattson.
The annual Colorado Program and Capability Review for Homeland Security was held at the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs on December 5-6, 2006. Homeland Security regions and state agencies were represented at the workshop to discuss and recommend the most likely National Planning Scenarios, prioritize capabilities, and identify needs to be developed into initiatives for the Colorado State Homeland Security Program. The following staff from the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence assisted with the development of assessment instruments, data collection, and facilitation of the two-day workshop: Bill Woodward, Jane Grady, Susanne Maher, and Susan Lineberry.
Joanne Belknap presented a talk entitled "Responding to Domestic Violence" at The Center for Court Intervention in New York City, New York, in November 2006.
The Delbert S. Elliott Lecture in Criminology
On October 3, the Problem Behavior Program initiated an annual lecture series in criminology named after our colleague Del Elliott. Del was the program director from 1997 to 2004 and currently serves as the director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence. Del has made fundamentally important contributions to many aspects of criminology, including the longitudinal investigation of delinquent and criminal careers and the development of effective programs to prevent and treat offending. We are delighted that we are able to have an annual lecture series to recognize Del's contributions to scholarship and to the Institute of Behavioral Science.
The series was launched with a stellar lecture presented by Professor David Hawkins, Endowed Professor of Prevention, School of Social work at the University of Washington. David's scholarly career mirrors Del's in interesting ways. He is the director of the Seattle Social Development Project, one of our most influential longitudinal studies of delinquency and drug use. Based on the results of that study, David and his colleagues have initiated a delinquency prevention program, Communities That Care, that has been carefully evaluated and widely adopted, both in this country and abroad. David's lecture presented core results from the Seattle project from grade school thru age 27. He also presented compelling evidence about the long-term effectiveness of prevention programs which extend well into the person's life course. Overall it was a lively presentation and discussion, and we look forward to hosting the Elliott Lecture for many years to come.
Congratulations to Dorothy Watson for having completed 20 years of service with the University of Colorado at Boulder!
Joanne Belknap presented a talk entitled "Pathways to Prison: A Gendered Analysis" at the University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma, in October 2006.
Dick Jessor and Jane Menken were in Italy and Turkey in late April and early May, 2006. Jessor was an invited speaker at the University of Bologna where he talked to a class in Health Psychology and then gave a public lecture on April 27 in the series "I giovedi di Psicologia" ( Psychology Thursdays") at the new branch of the university in Cesena. On May 4, Jessor served as discussant for an international symposium on "Personal and Social Correlates of Risk Behavior in Adolescence" at the Biennial Meeting of the European Association for Research on Adolescence (EARA), which was held in Antalya, Turkey. On May 5, he presented a keynote address at the meeting. And, on May 9th and 10th, Jessor lectured to an undergraduate class and a graduate class in Developmental Psychology at the University of Torino.
The inaugural 2006 Blueprints for Violence Prevention Conference was held in Denver at the Adams Mark Hotel March 13-15th. This first of its kind conference offered three days of valuable information and discussion, including keynote addresses and breakout sessions that explored model violence, delinquency and drug prevention programs. The goal was to provide support, guidance, and tools to help practitioners implement evidence-based programs successfully in their own communities. Among the speakers were Delbert Elliott, Director of the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence; David Hawkins, Director of the Social Development Research Group at the University of Washington; Michele Ridge, prevention advocate in the State of Pennsylvania during the term of ex-governor Tom Ridge; Robert Flores, Administrator, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention; Gilbert Botvin, Director, Institute for Prevention Research at Cornell University, and others. The conference drew over 1,000 national and international participants. Evaluations of the conference were overwhelmingly positive, with the general consensus that this conference needs to be repeated.
Blueprints Conference March 13-15, 2006: Denver Conference To Highlight Model Programs Proven To Reduce Violence, Delinquency And Drug Use
Blueprints Conference News Release
Sharon Mihalic attended a meeting held by the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) at the Alex Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee, December 4 - 7. One in three black baby boys born in 2001 will go to prison at some point in his life. CDF is committed to dismantling the "cradle to prison pipeline." The meeting included presentations, discussion and brainstorming from team members from 10 innovative and successful jurisdictions, as well as some research experts. The goal was to share strategies for success, discuss the common elements of and challenges to developing comprehensive and integrated services, and develop a joint blueprint for change.
David Miklowitz, Problem Behavior Faculty Research Associate and professor of psychology, received the Mogens Schou Award for Research at the Sixth International Conference on Bipolar Disorder in June in Pittsburgh. Miklowitz has focused his research on developing effective approaches to educate families affected by bipolar disorder on the many factors contributing to control of the disease and its relapse. The Mogens Schou Awards were named in recognition and appreciation of Mogens Schou, honorary president of the International Society of Bipolar Disorders and emeritus professor at the Psychiatric Hospital in Risskov, Denmark, whose groundbreaking research 50 years ago proved lithium's significant mood-stabilizing effects for the treatment of bipolar disorders. --from Silver & Gold Record December 8, 2005
Sharon Mihalic attended and presented a paper at the American Society of Criminology Meetings in Toronto November 15-19. Topic: Findings from the Blueprints Replication Initiative: Ensuring Implementation Success.
Terence P. Thornberry, Problem Behavior Director and Director of the Rochester Youth Development Study, was one of only 16 experts invited to speak October 27, 2005 at a White House conference entitled "Helping America's Youth," organized by First Lady Laura Bush. The conference was designed to help communities throughout the country provide better, more scientifically-based programs to help children and adolescents. Thornberry used the Rochester study findings to identify both risk factors for problem behaviors and effective programs for helping at-risk youth.
A feature article, "Summit of a career", highlighting Richard Jessor and his career at the University of Colorado and the Institute of Behavioral Science was published in the Rocky Mountain News October 24, 2005.
Richard Jessor has been named distinguished professor. This is the highest honor that CU awards to faculty members. He is one of only 43 faculty members to receive the designation in the history of CU. Congratulations to him for this great and richly deserved honor! His nomination will be approved at the December Board of Regents meeting.
Donated from the files of Richard Jessor, the very first IBS newsletter (December, 1959) was called THE INSTI - TOOTER.
July 19, 2005 will see Del Elliott presenting at The National Institute of Justice's Annual Conference on Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation in Washington, DC. Del will be the Luncheon and Keynote Presenter and the title of his presentation at this conference, which is expected to draw around 800 justice researchers and practitioners, is entitled: Crime Prevention - Promise and Practice.
